The present invention relates to data processing by a computing device, and more particularly to developing applications using configurable patterns and visual database modeling.
A user interface (UI) facilitates interaction between humans and computers by inviting and responding to user input. User interfaces come in many varieties, and are designed to work in concert with application programs. Application programs, sometimes referred to simply as applications, are programs that an end-user runs to accomplish certain tasks. Applications typically work in conjunction with one or more back-end systems, which store the data to be worked on (e.g., business objects and other business data), as well as logic for manipulating the data (e.g., transactions or other business logic). Examples of back-end systems include database systems, enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, and customer relationship management (CRM) systems.
A common scenario involving user interfaces is a network application, where a network connects an application program running on a server and one or more user interfaces displayed in client programs running on client devices. The client/server relationship is one in which a server provides services to the client devices. Both the client devices and the server typically have a network interface for accessing networks such as a local area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN), or the Internet.
In a network environment, a common client device is a personal computer, and a common client program is a Web browser. The client program, which displays a user interface for an application running on a server, enables networked communication between the client device and the server using a data transfer protocol (e.g., the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP)) to exchange files, images, programs, and/or application data. HTTP is a request/response-type protocol that specifies how the client device and the server communicate with each other. The server may receive a request from the client device using HTTP, respond to the request, and then close the connection. HTTP is a stateless protocol, meaning that each time a client device requests a Web page, the server will respond to the request independently of any previous requests from the client device, and without recording the request.
The information transmitted from the server and intended for display by the client program on the client device may be described with Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) code or Extensible Markup Language (XML) code. HTML is a language that is used to describe the structure of a document, such as a Web page. Client programs interpret HTML code to determine how to display the information contained in the page. A user may request a Web page from a server by clicking on a hyperlink or specifying a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) string. A URL can be used to identify the address of a file or Web page that may be accessed on a network. The address identifies the Web server on which the file or Web page is stored and the directory in which the item is located. When the server receiving the URL request finds a sought Web page, the server sends the page to the client device so that the client device can use that Web page, for example, by generating a display for a user according to the Web page.
An application usually implements the functionality required to display and execute one or more user interfaces for the application. For this reason, an application is sometimes referred to as a user interface application. In some cases, part of the user interface functionality (e.g., rendering) may be handled by a client program that interacts with the application. Whether or not this can occur depends on the capabilities of the client program.
Companies typically use many applications in the course of their businesses. For example, they may use one application for sales and a different application for inventory management. Typically each application is accessed through a separate user interface.
Recently, companies have started to unify their applications so that they can be accessed through a single interface, in some cases referred to as a portal. However, many companies who have a portal also have legacy applications that cannot be accessed through the portal. Migrating these legacy applications so that they can be executed in a portal environment often requires rewriting the application code, a process that can take several weeks.